How do we prevent the development of mental health problems and get help earlier for children, young people, adults and older adults starting to suffer poor mental wellbeing?

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In March 2015, the government launched “Future in Mind” a strategy to improve mental health and wellbeing support for children and young people. Figures have shown over half of mental health problems starting by the age of 14 years and 75% by 18 years. The government in January 2017 announced further plans to “transform” attitudes to mental health reminding us – one in four people has suffered from a mental disorder at some point in their life at an annual cost of £105bn.

We are particularly looking for innovations from individuals/teams/organisations which:

Focus on early years (perinatal/parent and child/attachment/school readiness)

Assist/support schools and education to identify vulnerabilities and risk markers for mental illness and build preventative resilience and wellbeing practices

Utilise digital and social media tools across all (universal) community / organisational / educational and public groups to raise awareness, promote self-help and resilience building strategies, reduce stigma and encourage sharing of practice.

Utilise integrated approaches across mental health service providers, sectors, professions and sectors, professions and organisations. Child and youth mental health services that focus on prevention/education and early identification.

Innovations can be associated with any of the following:

Development of support, interventions, coping skills and strategies (including signposting people to the right help) to assist and enable children, young people and adults (including older adults) improve their mental wellbeing and prevent mental illness in a variety of settings.

Workforce training, learning and development and role development for healthcare providers, social care, education, voluntary sector and people supporting young people, adults and older adults in improving, preventing and treating mental illness.

Use of data and information to assist in targeting and supporting specific groups of young people and adults and older adults and areas of need

Communication, specifically raising awareness, reducing stigma and understanding of mental health among the wider population

Integrated service design and delivery, partnership working across sectors and professional groups (social care, education, healthcare, voluntary sectors, etc.)

New approaches to commissioning, development and purchasing services to agreed outcomes

Increase and support people into education, training and employment opportunities

Support for more looked after children and/or ex-offender

Tackling all types of domestic abuse and violence

We intend to measure success by:

Fewer children affected by their and/or their parents’ poor mental health;

Fewer people aged 0-25 being admitted to emergency departments for deliberate self-harm;

Fewer suicides;

Improved school surveys, relating to mental wellbeing;

Fewer exclusion from schools;

Fewer repeat violent episodes; and

Fewer children and young people reporting that they are frequently bullied.

Ideas (Publish, Detailed Submission)

Our Game Based Learning platform, could be easily deployed to support the WM Mental Health community - parents, carers, teachers, clinical staff, in early recognition, intervention and prevention, especially for early intervention of young people.

Overview of Innovation:

Our Game Based Learning platform has a unique difference over 'other' digital / serious games providers. Our platform provides the ability to easily change, update and amend game experiences, so that any investment in an experience is extended to address an organisations ever changing requirements. Our platform allows a Game Based Learning experience to be developed in under 10 days and can be changed / updated in minutes. The platform is available 'locally' or in the Cloud and can be deployed on Tablets, PCs or via the Internet. We have already successfully worked with and developed a number of games within the Healthcare Industry - namely around the subject of 'Stop the Pressure' - Pressure Ulcer training for Tissue Viability professionals.

We believe that our Game Based Learning platform could be deployed to assist the Mental Health community to drive communication, early intervention and help with prevention of Mental Health - especially within the area of young people, as a Game Based Learning experience is un-intrusive, engaging and enjoyable, thus suiting the demographics for the younger generation.

Game Based Learning, provides an engaging conduit to deliver knowledge in an enjoyable format, games generally result in players relaxing and engaging in the defined subject. This creates a learning platform that is open to all levels of intelligence and education, providing an level playing field for the overall audience.

Stage of Development:

Market ready and adopted - Fully proven, commercially deployable, market ready and already adopted in some areas (in a different region or sector)

The 'Future in Mind' report commissioned by the NHS, clearly discusses the benefits of early intervention relating to mental health, especially for the younger population. To achieve early intervention successfully, the whole 'mental health' community must be involved - peers, parents, teachers, friends, professionals etc. Applio believes that a proof of concepts - Game Based Learning experience, would greatly assist in breaking down the barriers in the 'openness' and 'discussions' relating to this difficult subject. Games have the ability to really engage an audience, provide an enjoyable way to discuss a subject, break down perceived barriers and drive engagement within the younger community - they are after all, already playing digital games!

Initial Review Rating4.60 (1 ratings)

Benefit to WM population:

Delivering a proof of concepts Games Based learning platform as a trial within the West Midlands Mental Health arena, would provide the West Midlands with the required analytics required to measure the impact of what we are proposing. Should the analytics prove to be beneficial, then the West Midlands would benefit in relation to the whole Mental Health community being able to successfully communicate, provide early intervention and improve prevention in the younger generation of the West Midlands. This could then be showcased to the greater community of the NHS.
We believe that the proof of concepts would only require approximately 20 to 25 days of time from Applio, obviously we would require input from experienced practitioners, which we estimate to be between 3 and 6 days.

Current and planned activity:

We have already provided Game Based Learning experiences to the NHS in partnership with WMAHSN, we created two experiences relating to 'Stop The Pressure' - Pressure Ulcer training for Tissue Viability professionals. One experience was 'story' based - about a patient called Angela Smith. The other a competitive team vs. team experience that contained numerous questions and scenarios addressing the very technical issues of Pressure Ulcers. The games were played at team meetings and the feedback was excellent:

‘What a great way to learn, really enjoyable and engaging’‘So much better and engaging that listening to a PowerPoint presentation’

Applio would recommend as next steps that we arrange in partnership with the NHS a 2hr workshop with a relevant Mental Health professional to hold initial discussions that would provide Applio with enough information to develop a 'demo' game experience, this would prove the technology and provide the foundation to drive this initiative forward.

What is the intellectual property status of your innovation?:

Currently Applio is in discussions with an IP specialist firm, which is looking into the applicability of IP for our Games Based Learning platform.